


It Was Meant to be a Chill Replay

by StellarOwl



Category: HLVRAI - Fandom, Half-Life VR but the AI is Self-Aware - Fandom
Genre: Action/Adventure, But I hope you like it anyways, Gen, No Romance, That's why I didn't tag it, benry dies again but it's temporary, don't worry about the oc - Freeform, no shipping except friendship, she's actually sort of a minor character, the plot might be a little weird
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-11-27
Updated: 2020-12-04
Packaged: 2021-03-09 19:07:13
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 5
Words: 10,844
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27741241
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/StellarOwl/pseuds/StellarOwl
Summary: Gordon missed his friends, and he felt like he owed Benry an apology, so he decided to play the game again. He saved the Science Team + Benry on a USB drive before resetting the game, so they'd still remember the previous adventure. He then put them back in the game, so they could do a "chill replay" and hang out without having to fight each other.But he didn't realize that the Science Team and Benry weren't the only sentient AI in the game. And things have once again gone a bit wacky.
Relationships: The Science Team & Benry, The Science Team & Darnold, The Science Team & Forzen, The Science Team (HLVRAI)
Comments: 8
Kudos: 26





	1. Prologue, I guess

**Author's Note:**

> Let's be real. I'm kind of terrified. We're a new and passionate fandom, us HLVRAI people, and I know how that worked out for Undertale. Basically, I can't help feeling like you're going to hate me. Or judge me. Or say that it's cringe and everything's wrong with how I write these characters. But there's a more rational side of me that says I'm proud of how this is turning out so far, and I want to share it with people, and someone out there will be glad to see it. So I'm posting it anyways. I hope you enjoy it.
> 
> (This has been "StellarOwl getting too real at the beginning of a fanfic". Now, back to our regularly scheduled nonsense.)

"Alright. Here we go..." The game had been reset; his friends, downloaded. And Benry. He wasn't exactly looking forward to facing Benry, but he had thought about everything after the fact, and he realized he could have probably (definitely) handled the situation a little better. It would be wrong to just leave Benry without an apology. So he put on the VR set and re-entered the world of HLVR.

It started up right where it had the first time: He was walking down a hallway, in a hurry, because he was late. Reflexively, he waved hello to a couple of scientists as he passed, before being stopped by a security guard.

"hey. you got your... passport?"

He held himself back from panicking and running when he heard the monotone voice, and answered, "Yeah, just a minute. Follow me in here." He didn't want that other, random guard to hear their conversation. That would just make it even more awkward.

"Okay," he said when he thought they were out of earshot of anyone, "Benry, look. I was kind of a butthead last time. I was stressed, and I took it out on you because you were annoying me, and while I am still cheesed that you cut my arm off, I antagonized you just as much. Heck, I shot you one time! Maybe I deserved that big fight." Gordon realized that he was rambling. "Essentially, I was just as much of a jerk as you, or more, so I'm sorry."

He waited nervously for one of the two reactions he knew would happen: either Benry would say it was too late and still hate him, or he'd just go "huh wha?" which was almost worse. If Benry hadn't even been listening, what the heck did that mean? He wouldn't know what to expect.

Instead, Benry just said "yeah we're cool. someone had to do it" which was relieving, but...

"What does that even mean?"

"yeah you're right. probably not. there's probably some backup thing for big friendship times or something. doesn't matter"

" _What_ does that _even mean?"_

"uhh, gotta get to your job, lateman. gotta get the rest of the gang together."

"Alright." That was actually a good idea. He was here to hang out with the Science Team, so finding them should be the next thing on the list. Tommy was the first of the scientists to show up, just as he had been in the previous playthrough.

"Hello, Mr. Freeman!" Tommy exclaimed. "We've missed you."

"Hey, Tommy! Heading to the break room again?"

"I was going to, but now you're back. Aren't we going to hang out?"

"Yeah. Just gotta get the others. They should be this way."

"HELLO, GORDON! Another day, another dollar!" Dr. Coomer greeted enthusiastically as soon as they entered the next room. "I wasn't sure if you would come back for us!" Although his words indicated teary-eyed relief, his tone of voice sounded as cheerful as ever.

"Well, yeah, couldn't exactly leave with you guilt-tripping me like that," Gordon joked. "Anyways, do you know where Bubby is? Just have to find him and we'll be ready to go."

"He's over near the HEV suits." Dr. Coomer said. "He's impatient, Gordon. Let's get this party started!"

"You sure you're not the impatient one?" Gordon asked, walking over to where Bubby was standing with his arms folded, and glaring. "Oh. I see what you meant..."

"Well, you certainly took your time!" Bubby exclaimed.

"Well, I'm here now," Gordon answered. "So let's get this party started, I guess?"

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Originally, I wasn't going to have a prologue, so it's just a little rushed. But I thought it would help to have one instead of just throwing you into the weirdness. Also, in case anyone didn't get it, that whole
> 
> "yeah we're cool. someone had to do it"
> 
> "What does that even mean?"
> 
> "yeah you're right. probably not. there's probably some backup thing for big friendship times or something. doesn't matter"
> 
> thing is Benry saying "No big deal, someone had to be the bad guy" and then saying "actually no, if we were all friends, the game would have made something else for us to fight. But we're still chill." Just thought I should clear that up in case Gordon isn't the only person Benry confused with those statements. I want my readers (if I have any) to understand what I'm saying.


	2. Lunch for Breakfast

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The team has a picnic. Tommy does a neat trick. Benry makes a sick reference. And a particular soldier NPC is acting strangely.

“Okay, so… I know technically, it’s the beginning of the playthrough or whatever. It’s about 8 AM, we haven’t really done anything yet—”

“It is 8:45, Gordon. You’re late for the experiment!” Dr. Coomer interrupted. Gordon knew he couldn’t help it, so he let it slide.

“And I get that. But from _my_ perspective, we’ve just had a whole long adventure over the course of multiple days, and I haven’t had anything to eat other than a couple bags of chips. So, what do you say we find some food and have a picnic?”

“Wow, an actual good idea.” Bubby commented. “I bet I could find some eggs here, or pigeons. If you want to eat pigeons.”

“eat some uhh, **o s t r i c h**.” Benry “corrected”, but he didn’t look like he objected to the idea.

“I told you you’d need the calories!” Tommy said. It would have been gloating coming from anyone else, but coming from him, it just sounded like he was worried about them. Of course, it’s possible that he _was_ gloating, as his voice always sounded like that. “I can go back to my drawer. There’s tic-tacs there.”

Gordon wanted to tell Tommy that human beings couldn’t survive on just tic-tacs, but for all he knew these were magical nutrition tic-tacs. That would probably be the _least_ weird thing he’d encountered here.

Dr. Coomer volunteered himself to go find a snack machine, Tommy set off for his office, and Benry followed Bubby around, looking for “ostriches”, leaving Gordon alone in the room. He kind of felt like he should be trying to contribute, too, especially since it was his idea, but he couldn’t think of anything to do. Chips, candy, soda, and pigeons were about the only sources of food here, and the rest of the team had that pretty much covered. Well, there was that one microwave lasagna in the break room, but he wasn’t going to touch that this time around, since he knew it would just explode.

Being by himself was pretty peaceful, actually. Now that he knew all his friends had superpowers, he didn’t have to worry as much about keeping them safe, so them being out of his sight wasn’t as stressful as it might have otherwise been. It was nice to have a moment to just sit there by himself, without anybody talking to him… And there were loud footsteps, coming down the hall. _Great._ They were back already.

But then he saw the person marching into the room and it wasn’t a member of his own team. It was a soldier- wait a second, the soldiers weren’t supposed to be here yet! They weren’t supposed to get here until after everything broke and aliens started spawning. And- hang on, wasn’t that the guy- what was his name again? Forzen! Gordon leapt to his feet and just barely kept himself from shouting at the dog-threatening jerk. Getting into an argument would probably be unwise, especially since Forzen was apparently different from the other soldiers. As mean as he was, maybe he was like the Science Team in a way? (Besides, the last time he had lost his temper at someone, that someone had become the final boss. He didn’t want a repeat of that situation.)

“Uh, hi.” Gordon awkwardly waved at the soldier. “You’re not gonna try and shoot me… right?”

“Wha? No, I’m here to fight the aliens,” Forzen answered. Gordon noticed now what he hadn’t when they were under more pressure: Forzen seemed sort of… dazed? Was Forzen high or something? Surely that wasn’t allowed, for soldiers to be on drugs during a mission. Not that he was in any position to judge, with what the HEV suit did to him. It was surprising, was all. At least the soldier seemed friendly, this time around.

“I probably ought to warn you, the rest of the Science Team will be coming back soon, and, uh, well, they- especially Dr. Coomer- uh, he’s got sort of a ‘thing’ about the U. S. Military.” It was an awkward sort of sentence, and Gordon paused a couple of times thinking of how he wanted to say it. He wanted to warn Forzen, but he didn’t want to give the impression that they were all incredibly trigger-happy criminals- which they were, but still. “Maybe you should let me introduce you to them first, so they know you’re on, uh, ‘Team Nice’.”

“I’m the only one on Team Nice,” Forzen echoed. He said it reflexively, like he was reciting something. Then there was the sound of partially metallic footsteps, and Dr. Coomer stepped into the room, his extendo-arms wrapped around an entire vending machine full of chips.

“GORDON, I FOUND CHIPS.”

“So, you did, doc…” Gordon laughed nervously. There was no way he’d be able to stop Dr. Coomer from killing the rather generic-looking soldier on his own. He’d have to keep Forzen out of Coomer’s view until Tommy got back, at least. As much as he wasn’t a fan of Forzen, he didn’t want Forzen dead, or a sworn enemy of the team again- especially if he turned out to be one of the “real” ones. “Could you put them, uh… over there?”

“WHERE? GORDON, I’M BLIND. HELP ME, GORDON--” He stumbled, almost tripping over some random garbage on the floor. Fortunately, he regained his balance on his own and did not crush himself or Gordon under the vending machine.

“Over this way,” Gordon answered. “Just follow my voice.” He led Dr. Coomer to the wall opposite of where Forzen was hanging out and motioned for the soldier to duck behind a stack of crates before he told Dr. Coomer to set the vending machine down. Forzen, however, did no such thing, and continued to just stand in place, as if standing at attention.

Fortunately, at that moment, Tommy, Bubby and Benry returned with their supplies. Bubby was holding two pigeons and looking far too smug about it, Tommy was carrying an entire desk drawer filled with loose orange, yellow and green tic-tacs, and Benry was using his helmet as a basket to hold quite a large collection of pigeon eggs. But wait- he was still wearing his helmet. Did he seriously steal someone else’s helmet to use as a basket? Or did he actually summon a second helmet for himself? Was it helmets all the way down? Gordon decided not to question it.

“Hey guys, welcome back!” He said, genuinely grateful that they had returned- especially Tommy. If anyone could keep two people from killing each other, it was Tommy. Benry probably could, too, but he also probably wouldn’t _want_ to. The other members of the Science Team all answered back with various greetings.

Then a few things happened very quickly: First, Dr. Coomer looked over and spotted Forzen. “LOOK, GORDON! A MEMBER OF THE UNITED STATES MILITARY!” He shouted joyfully, and _everyone_ looked at Forzen.

Secondly, as soon as Benry noticed the soldier, he stepped forward and tried talking to him. “ayyy, it’s the beyblade boy. wassup, Frozen 2?”

The third thing that happened was that almost before Benry had finished speaking, Forzen had aimed a _really big gun_ at Benry’s chest.

“whas this about?” Benry asked, sounding like he was dealing with a boring irritation rather than someone pointing a gun at him. “im a big cool. don’t fight me. we’re best friends, bro.”

“We… _were_ best friends.” Forzen responded, looking a little confused. A few bright yellow notes of Sweet Voice escaped Benry’s lips and Tommy shouted something about “Surprised worry” as Forzen pulled the trigger on the gun.

“I thought you said you were on Team Nice!” Gordon shouted. Dr. Coomer rushed forward on his right side, shouting “ _This_ is why we need to kill the entire U. S. Military!” From somewhere to Gordon’s left, Tommy shouted: “Wait, we need to…” and then stopped.

And then, everything stopped.

This was the first time Gordon had ever seen Tommy use his powers. Unlike his father’s time-stop, which was a chilly blue, Tommy’s time-stop filled the air with a warm, golden light. Tommy himself just kept standing there for a couple of seconds, as if he were also frozen in place, before saying, “We need to understand. It’s like at the bossfight with Benry, you didn’t understand. But this time… I don’t understand, either.” He walked forwards and examined the temporarily dead Benry for a moment, then turned his attention to the soldier who had shot him.

“This is the soldier who shot- will shoot- er, might shoot Sunkist. He’s… not good. But Benry expected a different reaction. Not a- a gun to the face. And Benry was… worried. That’s highlighter flurry, surprise and worry.”

“Why would he be worried, though?” Gordon asked. “I mean, he’s never seemed to care about dying before.”

“I think…” Tommy said slowly, “he was worried for Forzen. They were best friends, he said- and I mean, he says that about a lot of people, but. Forzen sort of confirmed it. Did you say he was on a team- on Team Nice?”

“Yeah, I was quoting something he said when we met him on the, uh, the real adventure. The first one. Remember when we asked if he was alone? And he said he was the only one in ‘Team Nice’. So I sort of quoted that at him, like ‘I’ll introduce you to the group so Coomer can’t kill you before I tell them you’re part of Team Nice’ or something like that, and he sort of, I dunno, quoted it back at me, ‘I’m the only one in Team Nice,’ like it meant something.”

While Gordon was talking, Tommy reached into one of the pockets on the soldier's camouflage pants and pulled out a passport. Gordon groaned when he saw what Tommy was showing him. “Not these again,” he complained. “This mean Forzen’s gonna be the big final boss this time?”

“I don’t think that’s been decided yet. But- look at this.” He flipped open the passport and tapped on green letters that were stamped across it: T E A M N I C E, with a symbol that looked like a green soap bubble next to it.

“Wow,” Gordon couldn’t help laughing a little. “He really is on Team Nice. Is that, like, an official thing? Why’s there a bubble next to it…?” Then he made a connection. Maybe it was a bit too big of a leap to make, but…

“Green means ‘isn’t mean’.” He whispered under his breath.

“You think so, too?” Tommy asked. “I mean, about the Sweet Voice?”

“I don’t know what I think,” Gordon answered truthfully. “I mean, yeah, it looks like a Sweet Voice bubble to me, but I dunno if Forzen can use the Sweet Voice, or why that would put him on Team Nice or make him shoot Benry, or actually, _basically anything_ about the Sweet Voice. Humans- that’s not a thing humans do.” He reconsidered his words for a moment. “Well, other than Dr. Coomer, but he’s got loads of, like, cybernetic enhancements, so who knows.”

“Mr. Freeman, I don’t think Forzen can use the Sweet Voice,” Tommy said, but didn’t offer any further explanation. Instead, he put the man’s passport back into his pocket and began examining his face. Eventually, he seemed to have seen what he was looking for, and he stood back up.

“Okay,” Tommy said, “I think I understand. Can you- I need to- I need some help rearranging things. Pull Mr. Forzen behind those crates so he doesn’t get punched when I let things start again.”

Gordon did so, climbing behind Forzen and grabbing him under the armpits, then dragging him backwards behind the stack of crates he had refused to climb behind earlier. If Tommy understood what was going on, great! Gordon sure didn’t. But Tommy was the most responsible and trustworthy member of their group, and despite his secrets, he had the very important trait of _wanting people to survive_. Which meant that if Tommy told Gordon to help him out by displacing a former enemy by a few feet while time was stopped, he’d do that.

The world faded back to its usual colors and time resumed, chaotically. Dr. Coomer crashed into the wall. Forzen fell backwards behind the stack of crates. Bubby bent over to loot Benry’s collection of pigeon eggs.

“GUYS?” Tommy shouted over the noise. Everyone turned to look at him, although it took Dr. Coomer a moment longer, as he was recovering from crashing into the wall. “UH,” Tommy said, still at full volume. “IT’S—GORDON SAYS IT’S TIME FOR LUNCH.”

“It seems absurd to eat lunch at 8:55 in the morning, Gordon,” Dr. Coomer announced.

“Well, you seemed pretty on board with the idea when I mentioned it earlier,” Gordon retorted. “And I wasn’t the one who called it ‘lunch’, that was Tommy. But yeah, we were going to have a picnic, and I’d still like to do that.”

“I’d also like to eat!” Bubby interjected.

“Alright, what do we have?” Gordon asked. He could already see everything they had, but he was hoping to keep them distracted from Forzen, at least until Tommy was ready to tell everyone what was going on.

“I brought Snacks!” Dr. Coomer announced, pointing at the vending machine.

“I got pigeons!” Bubby answered immediately afterwards. “And Benry got eggs. A lot of eggs.”

“Are we sure Benry won’t mind us eating without him?" Gordon asked. "I mean yeah I’m super hungry, but I’m kinda… trying not to get on his bad side again after last time.”

“I don’t think he can eat anything while he’s a skeleton,” Tommy said. “And it takes him a while to get back to normal, like a—like a salamander regrowing its tail. I don’t- I think he wouldn’t mind if we don’t wait. I brought tic-tacs. And soda. Soda’s always good for lunch.”

“Alright, time to cook these eggs,” Bubby said, grinning and pulling out a flamethrower. “Stand back! Or don’t, I don’t care.” While Bubby flame-blasted the helmet full of eggs and Benry slowly despawned, Dr. Coomer was already consuming large quantities of chips and soda. Gordon grabbed a bag of Doritos but discovered that the nachos were stale and grabbed a can of soda to clean the taste out of his mouth.

“So, what exactly did you figure out about Forzen?” Gordon asked Tommy, using the tic-tacs as an excuse to step closer and have a conversation in private.

“I can’t tell you yet,” Tommy answered. “I’m waiting until Benry gets back, so everyone can hear it.”

“Well, the longer you wait, the more likely Coomer is to rediscover the guy,” Gordon answered, annoyed. “And we don’t want _that_ to happen!”

“We’ll just have to keep them occupied until then,” Tommy said, as if that was the obvious answer. To Gordon, though, it was not obvious. How exactly was he supposed to keep this chaotic team occupied for however long it took Benry to respawn? They liked shooting things, so maybe he could lead them to one of the rooms with a whole lot of aliens and monsters? But he hadn’t tried the experiment with the crystal yet. No monsters would be spawning in. And he didn’t want them going around shooting the other scientists, even if they weren’t as… three-dimensional as the Science Team.

“…How?”

“Talk to them? You’re good at that,” Tommy suggested. “Ask them things, like you did outside.”

“Okay…” He had only made conversation because it was the only semi-normal thing to do, and to fill an otherwise awkward silence. He didn’t think he- no, correction: he _knew_ he wasn’t an expert conversationalist. But he couldn’t think of anything better.

“Hey, everyone, what’s-uh, what’s your favorite foods?”

“Eggs and bacon are _always_ a good option,” Dr. Coomer answered.

“Alright, what about you, Bubby?”

Bubby grumbled a little bit before answering. “Gogurt.”

“Gogurt? Really? I’d have thought you’d eat, like, spicy foods or something!”

“Anything’s better if it comes in tubes,” Bubby bragged.

“Alright. Tommy? I bet I can guess your favorite kind of food, but let’s hear it from you.”

“I haven’t really tried a lot of food, but sour and sweet things are usually my favorite. Like soda, fruit-flavored candy, and, um, real fruit probably, I guess.”

“What do you mean you ‘haven’t tried a lot of food’?” Bubby asked.

“I just haven’t tried a lot. Soda’s mostly good enough,” Tommy answered. An answer that would be puzzling to anyone who didn’t know that Tommy wasn’t human, a group which evidently included Bubby and Dr. Coomer.

“What do you mean, ‘soda’s mostly good enough?’” Bubby practically shouted, as Coomer asserted that “Humans need more than just soda! Gatorade is important, too!”

“Oh, you thought I was human?” Tommy sounded genuinely puzzled.

“Well, that _would_ explain some things!” Coomer responded cheerfully, while Bubby answered accusatorily, “Gordon, did you know about this?”

“Why do you assume that _I’d_ know abou- okay, _yes_ , I knew about it, but that’s only because his dad showed up in the middle of our adventure, to tell me to keep him safe! As if he needs any help! I’m the little wimpy un-modified human of the party, I think sometimes I should be the one that’s getting the help!” Gordon took a few seconds to calm down. “Sorry, I’m just- this was supposed to be relaxing, a relaxing picnic, but things are going on, and I’m feeling all tense. Didn’t mean to yell at you like that, Bubby.”

**_“w u h?_ _”_**

A familiar voice sounded from behind Gordon, echoing like a gamer leaning too far into a low-quality microphone. He jumped, startled. “Benry?” Turning around, he saw Skeleton Benry standing just 3 feet away from him- too close, in his opinion. “Okay, first of all, can the others see you this time? Because last time, only I could see you, and they all thought I was going crazy…”

“what are you talkin bout?”

Of course. It was impossible to hold a conversation with Benry that Benry didn’t want to have, because he would just pretend that he didn’t understand. Gordon would have to consult the rest of his team. “Guys? Are you seeing this skeleton, or is it just me?”

“Oh! Hello, Benry!” Dr. Coomer exclaimed.

“you see- you like my, uh… undertale reference?”

“Yes! It is a ‘sick Undertale reference,’ Benry!”

“Sans is overrated,” commented Bubby.

Gordon didn’t know how Dr. Coomer could possibly be unfazed by seeing Benry as a skeleton for the first time, but then again, he- and Bubby, and basically everyone except Gordon himself, actually- had been unfazed by everything else Benry did: they didn’t mind him respawning, or hanging out with the soldiers, and they had accepted that rule about the passports as if it had always been there… even though the whole “boss fight” thing was in the past and they were more or less friends now, there was something about it that still bothered Gordon.

“hey, you stole my helmet,” Skeleton Benry said, pointing at Bubby’s cooking setup but sounding like he didn’t really care. “that’s stealing. you can’t do that.”

“What’s _your_ favorite food, Benry?” Dr. Coomer asked.

“mayonnaise,” Benry deadpanned. Or he could have been smiling, but it was impossible to tell because he was currently a skeleton.

“Anyway,” Gordon said before they could get even more sidetracked, “Tommy had something he wanted to say to Benry. Right, Tommy?”

“Yeah.” Tommy looked nervous. “Forzen shot you because they, um, the Sweet Voice— someone used it on him really well.”

“Wait.” Gordon interrupted. “Are you saying someone used Black Mesa Sweet Voice to—can it do that? Can Sweet Voice make people do things?” This was alarming news, and-- _Holy cow, that’s why nobody questioned the passport thing._

“Has Benry- Benry, have you been using Sweet Voice on everyone? Is that why they don’t question whenever you do some weird stuff like- like hanging out with soldiers? Or the passport thing? Did you hypnotize them?”

“look, I just wanna be friends, I’m a chill dude,” Benry defended. “and I didn’t do anything to beyblade boy, he’s my best friend.”

“He’s telling the truth, Mr. Freeman,” Tommy said. “This is better— stronger than what Benry does.”

“Well, that’s not worrying at all,” Bubby commented sarcastically. Gordon agreed wholeheartedly.

“Do- is there a way to fix it? I mean, he seems sort of like us, and I don’t think we should just leave him like this. Especially if he’s going to keep attacking us.”

“im just the bbeg, what do I know?” Benry answered. “I don’t help people.”

“Bee…beg? What?”

“I’m sure we can figure this out, Benry!” Dr. Coomer exclaimed. Apparently, nobody but Gordon was fazed by Benry’s strange terminology. As per usual. “We can beat up whoever hypnotized your friend, and he’ll be back to normal and won’t threaten dogs!”

“nah, the dog thing was all him. we scared him good, so he scared us. fair, right? he’s kinda over… what’s the word. does things too much. anyways, that’s just him, no big deal.”

“Benry! That was my dog!”

“yeah, I told him all about you. He knew it was immortal. Uh, what were we talking about again?”

It was taking so much mental effort right then for Gordon not to point both his hands at Benry and say _BOI_. “Dr. Coomer said that beating up the guy behind this would free your friend. Not sure why we’d want to do that after you literally told us that he willingly threatened a dog, but noble cause, rescuing someone, et cetera, so I'm probably going to end up doing it. But, I’m not sure just killing the guy who did this would work.”

“It’s always worked before, Gordon!” Dr. Coomer interjected.

“no, no, Feetman’s got a point,” Benry said, ignoring- or perhaps enjoying- how Gordon bristled at the nickname. “gotta, uh, get the bad guy on the map to kill em. Otherwise, gotta remove the status effects some other way.”

“Would potions work?” Tommy asked. “I mean, you were showing me Minecraft, and you said potions give status effects, so, so do you think that a potion could help Forzen? Like- like a bucket of milk!”

“dunno. maybe. you said Darnold uses sweet voice in his potions, right?”

“Yeah. That’s why I brought- I let Sunkist come to work.”

“Gordon, it is 9:07 AM. You are an hour late for the experiment!” Dr. Coomer interrupted. “I… did it again, didn’t I?”

“Yeah. I probably should head over there and do that, though, or the other scientists will be pestering us about it all day. Maybe this time, if Benry doesn’t follow me into the chamber, it won’t even explode, and it’ll all be okay!”

“I don’t…” Tommy began, then stopped. “Never mind. I don’t think the doors will unlock until you’ve done that anyway, Mr. Freeman. We should probably head over there. You lead the way.”

Gordon let Dr. Coomer lead the way instead, taking the last position in line so he could look back at what Tommy was doing. He saw Tommy pick up the helmet off the floor and dump out the hard-boiled pigeon eggs before placing the helmet on Forzen’s head. The soldier did not respond. Tommy caught Gordon looking at him and mouthed _just in case,_ before jogging to catch up with the group.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Aww, Coomer's starting to realize when he does the automatic dialogue thing! So proud of him!
> 
> Benry seems a little confused, was he meant to be the BBEG or was it just because Gordon was antagonizing him? He doesn't even know  
> While it is (mostly) just a game in this AU, they all do have their backstories, and worldbuilding is going on beyond the map. They just can't access it because they're stuck on the map.
> 
> Looks like Gordon forgot that Forzen and Darnold were more than NPCs. Fair enough though, since they only appeared for a short while, and neither of them joined the party.
> 
> Oh yeah, Gordon has no idea that the Resonance Cascade is actually supposed to happen... He thought it just messed up because Benry was in the room or something... he's in for a surprise.


	3. Create a New (Old) Disaster

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The Science Team begins their journey again. Gordon accumulates far too many nicknames. The helmet turns out to be useful.

Before he entered the test chamber, Gordon decided to lay down some ground rules. First, he was the only one meant to be in the room, so Benry would not follow him in there. He could stand outside and make sure nobody else was messing with things if that helped. Benry protested this rule at first, as he wanted to make sure Gordon wouldn’t just steal the crystal.

“Of all the- of all the things we did over the course of the entire adventure, as much as I realize I did some bad stuff too, did you _ever_ see _any_ of us steal anything?” Gordon challenged. Benry admitted that no, they hadn’t actually stolen anything other than soda, which for some reason, didn’t count. Gordon wondered if he’d ever understand Benry’s logic. Probably not. But at least Benry wouldn’t follow him into the test chamber this time around.

“And that goes for you too, Bubby. Don’t jump down into the chamber, even if something goes wrong. _Especially_ if something goes wrong. Please, everyone that is not named Gordon Freeman, stay out of the room.”

Dr. Coolatta, Dr. Bubby and Dr. Coomer were standing in the viewing window again, very unprofessionally fighting over the microphone. “Remember, slower than molasses—” was cut off by “Don’t screw this up again, Gor—” which was cut off by “Remember, Gordon, no smoking in the test chamber!” Which didn’t even make sense- he never smoked! But they were all trying to help. And this time, he wouldn’t be pushing the sample too fast out of annoyance, and Benry’s unlimited alien energy wouldn’t interfere with it, and whatever else might’ve gone wrong the first time would go right. This time, he would do things properly. He pressed the buttons that he needed to press, then climbed back down the ladder and grabbed the cart by its handles, making sure to push it forward slowly and smoothly like Tommy had told him to.

Even so, as soon as the crystal was positioned under the laser, things started going haywire. The laser turned green and bent at weird angles, arcing like lightning all over the room. It was just like the first time. Gordon didn’t know what he had done wrong- no, there was nothing he had done wrong. Bubby couldn’t blame it on him _this_ time. The satisfaction of knowing this wasn’t his fault was fleeting, though, as he was _still in an exploding test chamber_ and _really didn’t want to get knocked out again._ He tried to remember where all the pieces of catwalk and shards of crystal had been flung to the first time, so he could avoid them, but he was in panic mode, which wasn’t a good mode for remembering anything. Which is why, at the next flash of light, he dodged _directly into_ a falling piece of catwalk railing.

* * *

This time, when he woke up, Benry was looking down at him. “wow, sleeping on the job. lazy feetman”

“wh… what the…”

“bad at dodging. Little gordos clumsyman. gotta play, uh, beatsaber. get in practice”

“Benry? Why did—ow! ...oh, that- that hurts. hold on. …Why’d it still explode?”

Benry shrugged. “I dunno. part of the game. gotta fight some monsters now, lazy freeman”

It took Gordon a moment to register that he wasn’t in the test chamber anymore, and another to realize that Benry had used his real last name. Well, that was one plus to come from all of this.

“Did you, did you like carry me out of there?”

“yeah. not like it’s hard,” Benry scoffed. “Little baby shrimpman.” And there he went with the mocking nicknames again. A good thing couldn’t last, could it?

Bubby came running into the room. “I thought you said you wouldn’t screw it up this time!”

“I didn’t! I did everything right this time, I don’t—maybe that’s what’s supposed to happen?”

Bubby rolled his eyes. “Why would it be _supposed_ to blow up?”

"Never mind. Let's- let's go find the rest of the team and get Forzen to Darnold, or whatever the plan is."

* * *

Eventually, they got back to the room where they had had their picnic. It was kind of a pain to get there, having to dodge lasers and headcrabs and the occasional zombie, but having done this before, they were prepared and managed to get to the room without any injuries. Forzen was sitting on one of the crates, where Tommy had left him. There was a headcrab jumping at his face, but the guard helmet protected him and the creature just kept sliding off. _Didn't he say he was here to fight aliens?_ Gordon wondered. _Why didn't he shoot it?_

Tommy aimed a gun and fired way too many rounds into the headcrab, miraculously not damaging the soldier at all. "There. That's- now he's, the creature's gone." Tommy said, looking startled by his own shooting. "We should--"

"Look Gordon, a member of the United States Military!"

"NO. No, we're not doing this again. This is Forzen. We're trying to help him. Remember?"

"Of course I remember Forzen, Gordon! Don't be ridiculous!"

In the short span of time that Dr. Coomer and Gordon had been talking, Tommy had walked over to Forzen and started pulling him towards the door and the rest of the team. As they got closer, though, Forzen noticed Benry again and aimed his gun.

"Gun!" Gordon exclaimed. Dr. Coomer tacked Forzen and grabbed the weapon. "Gun!" He parroted back cheerfully, waving the confiscated weapon. Gordon facepalmed.

"Don't- for crying out loud, don't wave it around!" He paused for a moment, thinking. "If he's still trying to kill Benry, we need a different setup. Anyone think of a way to, like, keep him from doing that? Tie him up, or--" He stopped when he saw the look on Dr. Coomer's face. "No. I know what you're thinking. We're not using the 'ropes' for this. Maybe it would just be better to blindfold him? So he can't see Benry?"

"i got it," answered Benry, stepping behind Dr. Coomer and Forzen, who was still trying to get out of Dr. Coomer's grip and get his gun back. Benry grabbed the guard helmet that Forzen was wearing and spun it around, so that the back of the helmet blocked the soldier's vision. "easy mode."

"Easy mode. Right." Gordon could only hope it would be easy, but he knew that probably wouldn't be the case. "Let's go find Darnold."

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The chapter title is absolutely a Portal 2 reference. Do you have a problem with that?
> 
> Also, I feel like this chapter was too short, but it was a good stopping point, so... that's where it stops.  
> Anyway, I might not post the next chapter for a couple of days, until I figure some things out about what sections I want to include and what needs to be skipped. Ok?


	4. Escort Missions Are the Worst

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The team navigates the first few puzzles, with the added bonus (read: annoyance) of having to drag Forzen along with them.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I'm back, baby! Man, this chapter took longer than I thought it would.
> 
> So, I actually had to go back and rewatch so I could remember what the first few puzzles and challenges were. It was kinda hard to figure out where to end this chapter, so if it seems kind of awkward, sorry about that. I even considered splitting it in two at one point, but decided that would be too short.

The first room Gordon was really worried about crossing was the one with the broken catwalk, where they had to walk across the pipes. But even with dragging Forzen along, it actually wasn't that much of an issue, because Dr. Coomer just wrapped his ExtendoArms™ around the soldier and launched them both across the pit using his PowerLegs™. It was a rough landing, with the two of them, but the whole thing went smoothly overall, without anyone dying.

The hanging crates puzzle couldn't be solved so easily.

Bubby and Benry (who had at some point ceased to be a skeleton) had already parkoured to the other side of the pit by the time Gordon reminded the group that Forzen couldn't do it on his own, and they'd need to find some way of transporting him. Dr. Coomer offered to use his PowerLegs™ again, but this offer received an emphatic "No" as Gordon remembered the rough landing in the other room. If that happened on one of these crates, they'd fall off and die.

"We could just go around and come back up," Tommy offered.

"Go around _where?"_

"You know- like- like you go down, and come back up. Like a slide."

"That's not how slides work. That's not--" Then Gordon remembered he had heard Tommy say the slide thing before, in this same room in fact. Right after he had fallen all the way down and re-appeared on the other side of the chasm. "Can you teleport?"

"I don't know."

"Look. When you fell down there, what happened? Specifically."

"I- I went down and then I kept going, and I went up! It loops- it loops around!"

"It does _not_ 'loop around'. This is some kind of physics-breaking baloney that I'm not even going to try to make sense of right now. But what's _really relevant_ , is whether you teleported, or you died and respawned like Benry somehow does."

"wha? you say my name?"

"Yeah. Can you tell me if Tommy died the last time we were here?"

"looks pretty alive to me." Benry shrugged.

"Look. This is _important information._ For once in my life I'm trying to work with this alien nonsense, for once I think I might ACTUALLY HAVE A PLAN, and this is a very important part of it- I need to know this if- to tell if it's going to work or not. _Please._ Just work with me here." Why did Benry _insist_ on being difficult? Just because he couldn't die, he had to act like it was all, what, a joke?

"think he--"

"We are _trying to not get your friend killed._ "

"why'd you have to interrupt me like that? not cool. i was answering"

"Interrupting is very rude!" Dr. Coomer interjected.

"Okay, yes." Gordon tried to calm down. "What were you going to say, Benry?"

"think he didn't die. ever see a Tommy skeleton?"

"No..."

"then he didn't die." Gordon wasn't about to question the logic behind this. In fact, it actually lined up pretty well with how things seemed to work now.

"Tommy?" He asked. "I have a plan. You're going t- you're gonna need to, like, give Forzen a hug. Like Dr. Coomer is doing." Tommy did so, but Dr. Coomer did not let go of the soldier.

"Alright." Gordon resisted the urge to facepalm. "Dr. Coomer? Let go of- please let go of Forzen. Tommy's got this." Dr. Coomer released Forzen. "Okay. Now, Tommy, keep a good hold on Forzen, and- uh, go down the slide."

"There's no slide there!" Bubby exclaimed, looking down between the suspended crates.

"Just roll with it, man," Gordon pleaded, realizing as he did so how ironic it was for him to be the one telling someone to "roll with it". Tommy jumped off the edge and into the pit, taking Forzen with him. Moments later, they both appeared on the other side of the parkour puzzle.

"Okay, okay, good. It worked. Man, that was a risky thing to try," he realized. Then he saw Dr. Coomer launch himself across the chasm with his Powerlegs™, and realized that he was going to have to do this parkour by himself again. Oh, boy.

* * *

The next major obstacle they encountered (other than the "creatures," of course) was not one that Dr. Freeman had expected. It was something he had forgotten about, actually: the Physics Puzzle, where they had to get up to a ladder by pushing boxes together to use as stairs. Not for the first time, he wondered why on earth such a thing would exist. Yes, he knew that _technically_ this was all a game, but sometimes it was hard to remember that when it felt so real, and there was part of him that felt like it _had_ to be more real than it said on the label. It was its own whole little universe. Why else would there be things like... like... the "Team Nice" stamp on Forzen's passport? Why else would the story change so much because he downloaded a few of the characters?

But if it really was somehow its own little universe, what was the in-universe reason that the only way to get to this area was pushing some big boxes around?

"Okay, but, why does this even exist?" he asked, as Dr. Coomer cheered "Boxes! We can use these to help us climb up!" and shoved the larger box too far to the left.

"It's a Physics Puzzle!" Dr. Coomer declared. "We stole the idea from Aperture Science!"

"I'm pretty sure that's not right," Gordon said. "Didn't Aperture go out of business, like- man, I don't even know what year it's supposed to be here- but, a while ago? And I'm pretty sure they didn't require their scientists to do puzzles to get to their offices!"

"Well, we wouldn't have been _stupid_ enough to come up with it on our own," Bubby said. "Must have stolen it from somewhere." (Gordon doubted this. It was just 100%, Black Mesa-brand stupidity.)

"stealing's bad, don't do that," Benry (jokingly?) whined. Gordon thought he was maybe getting better at telling when Benry was joking.

"What, are you- are you going to try to arrest the crates?" He joked back. "Maybe that's the solution."

"wuh? why would I do that?"

"Never mind." So, he was mistaken, then. Well, they should probably get moving. He climbed up the boxes, and then up the ladder. He was followed by Bubby, then Benry, then Dr. Coomer. Tommy called to them from below.

"How are we go- going to get Forzen up there?"

"i have an idea," Benry said. "Coomer's in the way tho." He shoved Dr. Coomer back out of the little room and down the ladder. He was fine- it took a whole lot to damage Dr. Coomer- but the boxes were shoved out of place by his fall.

"You messed it up," Bubby commented, looking over Benry's shoulder as Tommy and Dr. Coomer struggled to line up the boxes correctly again. "That's still wrong. Don't make me come down there and fix it _for_ you!"

"No, wait, that's just fine Bubby," Gordon reassured him from the corner of the room with the vent. "They're- I'm sure they've almost got it." Having three people pushing the blocks around would only make it worse.

After a couple of minutes, the boxes were set up again. Benry called down to Tommy and Dr. Coomer, "can you nerf 'im?"

"What?" Tommy asked.

"take his gun. can't get any long-range shots in"

"Aha! Close combat!" Dr. Coomer exclaimed, grabbing the gun from the soldier for the second time that day.

"umm... hide it behind your back or something. then uhh, Tommy, gotta un-blind him. let him loose"

"Like a parakeet!" Tommy agreed, turning the guard helmet back around the correct way so that Forzen could see.

"Are you sure about this?" Gordon stage-whispered to Benry from the corner. Benry ignored him. Or maybe he just wasn't paying attention.

"heeere, Forzen Forzen Forzen," Benry called down the ladder like he was talking to a cat. "want some uhhh, Beyblades? PS4?" Forzen turned towards the sound. When he saw Benry, he reached for his weapon, which wasn't there. A brief look of confusion crossed his face, but then he started sprinting up the box stairs.

"oh? little- funny little noob wanna catch the alien?" Benry taunted from the top of the ladder. "im right here, bro. come get me- Woah!" Benry jumped back as Forzen lunged for the ladder and climbed up with, what was to Gordon, astonishing speed.

"He's up! Blindfold him!" Gordon shouted to whoever was the closest, and there was a chaotic scramble as multiple people tried to do just that. Eventually, though, it was accomplished, and Gordon was able to lead them through the vent and into the next area.

The next area, unfortunately, was full of turrets. How the heck had he forgotten this part? Okay, it had all been a chaotic mess, and he hadn't been _planning_ on doing this all again. And he did remember that the turrets were supposed to happen at some point. But the problem was that the turrets were happening _now_ , and he hadn't taken time to plan for it.

Everyone made a mad dash for the other side of the room, hiding behind wooden crates that didn't make very effective cover. Dr. Coomer took a couple of hits, but the bullets pinged off of his metal arms. Benry and Forzen were the last to cross the room, meaning that the crates the other four had hidden behind were no longer available as cover. Benry ran directly behind Forzen, shoving him forward. Miraculously, Benry didn't seem to get hit (although maybe he did, but it didn't affect him as much), but Gordon noticed Forzen stumble to the side a bit as he got hit in the shoulder.

"Guys, get in here," he urged, although they needed no further encouragement. "Anyone see any medkits? I don't think he can regen his shoulder." Unfortunately, there were no medkits in the area. If there was one, it would probably be empty anyway, he figured. That seemed to be how things worked here.

"i can help," Benry said, spitting a gradient of cyan to lime-green onto his friend's shoulder, which healed almost instantly.

"You can do that?"

"heal beam." Okay, yeah, he remembered Benry doing that before and Tommy saying something about a heal beam, but he had thought it was a joke or something, because Benry had never really used it when they needed it.

"We found all those empty medical stations, and needed healing- and you just didn't do anything about it?"

"wuh?"

"My _arm_ was _missing_ , and you didn't- okay, I actually get that part. You're the _reason_ my arm was missing, you wouldn't want it healed. But- even the other party members?"

Benry shrugged. "they're tough. pro gamers."

"Whatever." Gordon started pacing, trying to shove any other arguments out of his mind before they got sidetracked again. "Just- uh, just make sure to heal people this time. Um. Please?" Benry shrugged again. Looked like he wasn't getting any promises. He'd just have to hope their previous experience was enough to get them through this a little more safely.

* * *

Gordon was trying to plan ahead more now, running through the list of things they had encountered so far in his head. There was that tentacle creature by the rockets, but that should be later. The tanks and helicopters wouldn't be an issue until they got closer to the surface. Those assassin ladies, also, didn't start showing up until just before the ambush room...

...no. He wouldn't have to go through that again, would he? He and Benry were friends now, right?

But was that Benry's decision, or was it part of the boss-fight scripting? He might not have a choice. How much was supposed to happen, and how much was only because Gordon had antagonized him too much? Had he already fought with Benry this time enough to set them all on that path again? Would someone else betray him this time? Was that inevitable?

"Gordon? Are... are you alright?" It was Tommy.

"Yeah, I'm fine..." That was a blatant lie. But he needed to get back to figuring out what was next, not stop to talk about his problems with the rest of the team. Especially if it meant they would get the sense that he thought they would betray him again... they'd probably feel insulted, and- well, self-fulfilling prophecy stuff. Anyway.

Anyway, they were already at the next obstacle, and he hadn't thought of any way to deal with it.

This was the part where they had to jump for the ladder. He had no clue how they were going to get Forzen across it. Maybe they could do the thing where Tommy just fell into the hole and teleported them both to the next area? But he kind of had the impression that Tommy wasn't totally in control of that power, or at least didn't know how it worked.

"Hey, Tommy? Is there a slide here? Can you- do the thing?"

"It's not a slide. You can't see them."

"So... you don't know."

"I don't."

"I know!" Dr. Coomer shouted from behind them.

"What do you know, Dr. Coomer?"

" **Playground slides** are found in parks, schools, playgrounds and backyards. The slide is an example of the simple machine known as the inclined plane, which makes moving objects up and down easier, or in this case more fun. The slide may be flat, or half cylindrical or tubular to prevent falls. Slides are usually constructed of plastic or metal and they have a smooth surface that is either straight or wavy. The user, typically a child, climbs to the top of the slide via..."

"Of course," Gordon muttered, not really paying attention. "Okay, okay, what else can work? Bubby probably can't help- no offence, but fire doesn't seem helpful right here. Nor does turning into a car (still don't understand that, you're human, right?) Benry, uhh, not sure how much of your powers were due to you stealing passports, but maybe you could fly him across. If that won't work--"

"ROPES, GORDON!" Was the only warning he got as Dr. Coomer launched past him towards the ladder, with Forzen wrapped in one arm and a barnacle in the other. Both of them ended up squished against the ladder, tied there by the tongue of the barnacle.

"HELP-- Gordon, look! A member of the United States Military!"

How. How had Dr. Coomer somehow managed to make the situation _worse?_ Now none of them could use the ladder! He needed to think. First step would be getting Dr. Coomer and Forzen up the ladder, then they could all do that running jump thing they had done the first time. Okay, that was a step. But how would he get Dr. Coomer and Forzen up the ladder? They weren't even holding onto it, they were just tied there by Dr. Coomer's "rope launcher". Well, actually holding on to the ladder would be a start, at least.

"Dr. Coomer. Yeah. I know there's a military guy there. Don't worry about it. Just- can you actually grab onto the ladder?"

"I think so!" Dr. Coomer shifted around for a while, attempting to shove the barnacle under his arm. He eventually succeeded, apparently not noticing that he had accidentally knocked the helmet off of Forzen as he did so. "I'm holding the ladder, Gordon!"

"Okay. Good. Hm..." Losing the helmet would probably be a problem, but they'd have to deal with that later. "Can you, do you have any- like, you used your extendo-arms to pull me up that cliff. You can do that, right?"

"The ropes are too strong!"

"Then... untie them! I don't know!" He realized after he said it how hard it would be for Dr. Coomer to untangle the barnacle with one hand holding onto the ladder and his other arm wrapped around Forzen. But he didn't really see anything else he could do. Dr. Coomer had gotten himself into this mess, and at this point, only Dr. Coomer could get himself (and Forzen) out. What were the things Coomer could do? He was bulletproof (well, mostly bulletproof), had ExtendoArms™ (currently in use), PowerLegs™ (not useful right now), clones (probably more harmful than helpful), Wikipedia quotes--

Playcoins.

"Coomer, how many playcoins would it take to skip this section?"

"That would take- TWO! -Playcoins™, Gordon!"

"Alright, how many do I have?"

"Every player starts out with five Playcoins™! How many have you spent?"

"None, I think. Not this time around. It- it does reset each time, right?"

"Yes." Finally, some good news.

"Okay. Dr. Coomer, I would like to spend TWO playcoins to progress us _all_ to the next area," he said as loudly and clearly as possible. There was nothing in his inventory called Playcoins™, so he figured it was some kind of verbal transaction, and that Coomer would be handling the actual details. " _Including_ Forzen." He added, in case Forzen didn't count as part of the team or something.

"Okay! Here we g-" The world turned black and green for a moment. Then they were standing in front of a big, red sliding door with a bright red button next to it.

Oh, it was _this_ part.

"Tommy, don't you dare--"

_BANG!_

"Oh for crying out loud- EVERYONE HURRY UP!"

"I'm sorry Mr. Freeman, I just--" The rest of Tommy's sentence was drowned out by the sounds of the rest of the team panicking and rushing through the closing door. They took longer to get through than they should have because they were all pushing past each other, but nobody got crushed this time. As soon as they all got past the door, Bubby started walking into the red lasers again.

"No! Those are the turret ones! Just because they're red or whatever doesn't-" Too late. The turrets had already been activated. More running-through-bullets-behind-crates time. Tommy had started shooting back at the turrets from inside the safe zone, before running ahead of the rest of the group to the next safe zone. By the time they caught up he had already pressed the next button and had run further ahead, meaning that they had to slide under the door.

"WHAT THE HECK IS TOMMY'S PROBLEM?" Gordon shouted over the chaos of more turrets.

"There's just something about red buttons!" Bubby shouted back. Gordon thought he heard Benry say something, too, but he couldn't hear it clearly over the noise. Finally, they all got across and saw Tommy way ahead of them.

"Tommy! Why would you shoot that?" Gordon shouted as he continued to run to catch up with Tommy. "You knew from last time that they'd close on us! Were you _trying_ to leave us behind?" Okay, maybe it was a little harsh, but he'd expected Tommy, of all people, to know better.

"I- I don't know why! I wasn't- it was, it was all instinct! I didn't want to leave you behind!" Tommy said. "I don't... I don't _think_ I wanted to leave you behind..."

"competitive, uh, speedrun mode." Benry said, catching up to the group. Forzen tried to tackle him to the ground, but Benry phased through the floor and reappeared, floating, in the top corner of the room. "you're probably supposed to race him," he continued.

"...Huh." Gordon had kind of forgotten that Tommy was an AI too. With Dr. Coomer and Dr. Bubby, he was reminded every five minutes, with their chasing after ropes and the weird way they said things, just to name a couple examples. But the way Benry and Tommy spoke sounded much more natural, and if they were following some sort of scripting, it was much less obvious than it was with the older scientists.

"Okay, I guess that means we all have to keep up!" He said, laughing nervously. It was kind of worrying to be reminded that things like that could happen. He didn't know what all his friends were meant to do, originally. _Coomer's a a tutorial character, probably, and Tommy's apparently... some speed mode guy? Not clear what Bubby and Benry were supposed to do. Maybe Benry was even supposed to be the bad guy, and being nice this time around won't change anything._

_No. They're my friends. We can work through this together. Earlier today, Coomer caught himself when he was doing the scripted dialogue thing. That's a start. We can do this._ He had to believe that they could. If he thought otherwise, could he even call them his friends?

Well, for now they just had to keep going. They'd just have to plan things out a little better the next time they stopped to rest.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> You may have noticed Benry's crummy grammar (forgetting punctuation at the end of sentences, using "tho" instead of "though", etc). That's not a mistake on my part, that's just how he talks.
> 
> Gordon was right the first time about the "hey, stealing's bad" thing- Benry was joking. He just couldn't tell that the "what are you talking about" was also a joke.
> 
> Don't hate me if the Playcoin count is incorrect. I got the feeling that there was never a real consensus on how many playcoins he had at any point, just that it was a kind of low number.
> 
> Works cited: Dr. Coomer's slide monologue was copied directly from here: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Playground_slide  
> Also, all these puzzles were taken from HLVRAI Act 1, Part 2, so if you want to go back and see exactly what the team's facing, you can look there.


	5. Looking Kinda Sus

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Tommy is unintentionally threatening, Gordon points out some suspicious soldiers, and the team finally takes a break.

They had worked out a sort of system for dealing with Forzen's lack of helmet: Dr. Coomer would always be holding onto the soldier with at least one arm, and would grab the gun from him if he managed to find another one. It was a pretty good system, until they needed to cross trip mines or jump across something. Even then, they made it work, more or less. There was one very close call when Bubby challenged Dr. Coomer and Benry to a race, and Forzen, tagging along and chasing Benry, was about to step on a trip mine. Tommy froze time long enough to carefully grab Forzen's legs and make him step over the blue laser. Immediately afterwards, time started again, and Forzen ran past Tommy, knocking him over, completely oblivious to the fact that the guy had just saved his life.

"Tommy? You okay?" Gordon reached down to help Tommy up.

"Yeah, uh, I just haven't used the... stopping trick since I made Sunkist, or. Um, I've never used it at all depending on- on perspective. And using it twice, it- I'm a little out of practice."

"Okay. So that means we don't get any more freebies for a while?"

"What?"

"Like, you can't do any more time-stops for a while? Probably needs to recharge." He was starting to get used to this game-mechanics-applied-to-life thing. "Just trying to plan ahead here."

"Oh, yeah. You- you shouldn't count on me to save you." What? What was that supposed to mean? _He's just talking about the time_ _stops_ , he reassured himself. _That's all he meant._ _He isn't foreshadowing another betrayal. He didn't mean it to sound so ominous._

"Oh- alright. I'll keep that in mind," he said, a little more shakily than he meant to. He couldn't help remembering how good Tommy was with a gun, and that he was programmed to be a speedrun opponent. That he was literally built to leave people behind.

* * *

After catching up with the rest of the team and heading down a flight of stairs, they encountered the first soldier of the game, other than Forzen. The soldier ran into the room and gunned down two Coomer clones and one Bubby prototype, then noticed the group at the top of the stairs and aimed at them.

"Don't shoot!" Bubby shouted, pulling Forzen forward from the back of the group, where he had been frantically and to no avail trying to reach through the wall to get at Benry. "We've got one of your soldiers hostage!"

The Science Team didn't get to see whether this would have worked or not, though, because Dr. Coomer leaped over the side of the stairs and killed the soldier before he could react. Bubby was annoyed, but Gordon was actually relieved- while ordinarily, he would have preferred a nonviolent solution, he had seen how these soldiers disregarded their teammates' and their own safety. He had a feeling that the soldier would have shot anyway.

They stepped into an elevator with two other scientists, and Gordon braced himself, remembering that this was the part where Dr. Coomer had shot a scientist for no reason- it wasn't even one of his clones- and where Gordon himself had snapped, and had started shooting innocents. Now that he had a second chance, he wasn't going to let that happen again. He wasn't sure he could stop Dr. Coomer, though, especially in such a crowded elevator. Fortunately, though, with all... how many? Eight? People in the elevator, Dr. Coomer was unable to reach around and punch either of the NPCs, and Tommy was standing in his way of shooting the one outside of the elevator (Was he doing that on purpose?), so the elevator ride continued on without incident.

The following room more than made up for that, though. Big crates sat in the middle of the large concrete room, effectively turning it into an obstacle course. It was like a laser-tag arena, except that their opponents had real guns. And where Gordon had previously charged through, shooting without hesitation, he now paused, making sure each time that he wouldn't hit Forzen by mistake. This meant that the other soldiers had more of a chance to score a hit on him. And they did, multiple times. The HEV suit helped, it was essentially a suit of armor, but that didn't mean it didn't hurt.

After crossing a walkway, they came to another red door. This time, they managed to get through the door _before_ Tommy pressed the button. Down the hall, Gordon could see tombstones.

"Hey, I... I think this was the part where... yeah." Gordon stopped walking and turned around to face his team. "There's gonna be a soldier at the top of the bridge that goes across this next room. Last time, you shot at him, and he ran away. A little later, there was another soldier. We cornered him, and- Bubby- I think you shot him."

"I did," admitted Bubby. "You got really whiny about it, too. Where are you going with this?"

"Well, Benry wasn't there at the time, was he?"

"wuh?"

"Benry, you weren't there when we went into the tombstone room or cornered that other soldier later, right? I don't think I started seeing your skeleton until later." _Man, that's a weird thing to say._

"yeah, joined up with you later, I think. not clear. Respawning's kinda... kinda weird."

"Okay. So Benry wasn't here the first time. And both of those soldiers, the one on the bridge and the one that we cornered, they were acting kinda weird- they didn't shoot us. They just tried to run. So- also, we didn't meet Forzen until after these guys. So I'm thinking, _what if Forzen wasn't always the only member of Team Nice?"_

"It would make sense for them to have backups," Dr. Coomer pointed out.

"I thought he said he was the only one in Team Nice?" Tommy asked.

"Well yeah, but we met him after this point. Maybe he was the only one left."

"No, I meant today."

"Oh, yeah. That's right, he did." Gordon was kind of disappointed. He'd been feeling pretty smart, like he'd discovered a piece of the puzzle, and it was disproven so easily. "Well, maybe there's still something different about them. It still seems strange to me that they just ran like that."

"I think it's normal!" Dr. Coomer declared. The statement was so perfectly timed and cheerfully stated, that if anyone else had said it, Gordon would think it was meant to be a joke.

Wait- was Dr. Coomer making a joke? _Huh._ Somehow, it hadn't occurred to him that that was possible.

* * *

There was no soldier on the bridge. He wasn't sure at first, maybe he was just at the wrong angle to see them. But he got closer, and it didn't look like there was any way a soldier could really hide up there. _Weird..._ He heard a noise behind him and quickly turned around, thinking that the missing soldier had somehow snuck up behind him, but it was just Bubby getting lifted into the air by a barnacle- _wait_ that was a bad thing! He grabbed his gun, but Tommy was already on it, and Bubby fell back to the ground.

Gordon realized that maybe he wasn't processing things as fast as he should be. He probably needed a nap or something. They hadn't taken a break this early on the previous time around, but they hadn't had to deal with Forzen back there earlier. Although on the other hand, their teamwork had been a lot better this time around, and they had their previous experience to help them. Yeah, they should probably keep going to... where had they stopped the first time? They got out of the building, and there were more guns and tanks, and they went back in the building... wait. They hadn't even decided to stop and rest, did they? Gordon had just sort of broke down because he couldn't handle Benry haunting him on top of everything else, and just passed out crying on the floor.

...It would probably be smarter to take a break here, while they didn't have to deal with any enemies.

"Okay. I know it's a- a little early, and you probably want to keep moving," Gordon said, looking at Bubby especially. "But I really think we should take a break here, before we go any further. You all remember what it was like, right?"

"It _was_ a nightmare up there," Bubby admitted.

"It was like- it was pretty bad," Tommy agreed.

"So, uh, let's take a vote. Everyone for taking a break here, raise your hand." Gordon and Tommy raised their hands, and Bubby and Dr. Coomer did not. Benry looked over from cocooning Forzen in pale blue lights and said,

"Wha?"

"We're voting. Raise your hand if you want to stay here, and don't if you don't."

"Nice. Who won?"

"We don't... know yet? You still need to vote, dude."

"so I'm part of the group?"

"...Yeah?"

"POG. uhh yeah, we're staying here."

"Okay, good." Gordon went to sit down, and noticed Dr. Coomer staring at him. "You ok?"

"Gordon, I'm scared."

"We can head back up the hallway, that's a more secure area, I think."

"You _know_ what I'm talking about, Gordon!"

"What- _oh._ " _Every time you go to sleep, I can feel myself being torn apart, atom by atom..._ Right. He knew about the whole VR thing, and that meant he could feel when it shut down. "Look, I don't know what to do about that, I can't just run on unlimited energy like the rest of you! Maybe there's- do you still feel it if you go to sleep first?"

"I don't think so, Gordon. But I'm not tired!"

"Well, too bad because I am and we need to figure something out," Gordon mumbled, mostly to himself. Then he saw the blue-green cocoon out of the corner of his eye and got an idea.

"Hey, Benry? You know that Sweet Voice thing you're always using on me- 'calm down'?"

"yeah"

"Can you- can it make people fall asleep?"

"probably"

"Think you could try using it on Dr. Coomer?"

Rather than answering verbally, Benry sang a few low notes, and large bubbles of blue and purple floated in Dr. Coomer's direction. The orbs of color popped against Dr. Coomer's face, and he just stood there for a couple of seconds before declaring, "Gordon, I'm tired!" and collapsing onto the floor.

"I... guess it works," Gordon said, startled by the loud, metallic noise Dr. Coomer made when he landed. "Alright, I'm gonna go sleep over there. Wake me up if anything important happens. _Not_ by rolling me down a ladder."

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Sorry this took so long. I've kind of been working on another fic at the same time as this one, which isn't a good strategy probably, but gotta write it while I'm inspired, right?


End file.
